A wavelength scaled array of Doubly-Mirrored Balanced Antipodal Vivaldi Antennas (Dm-BAVAs)

A wideband phased array with an aperture made of two distinct element periodicities, which effectively thin the array, is presented. The topology is based on a "quantized" version of the wavelenght-scaled aperture. This thinning method was used in conjunction with the doubly-mirrored balanced antipodal Vivaldi antenna (Dm-BAVA) elements to substantially reduce the element (and T/R module) count of the array, while retaining good performance over the frequency range of 2-8 GHz (4:1 bandwidth). The use of modular Dm-BAVA elements is particularly beneficial in wavelength-scaled arrays because they allow easy assembly and appear to confine truncation effects to fewer elements around the discontinuities. The proposed structure offers a practical way to reduce the weight, cost and fabrication of large, wideband arrays. The majority of the studies in this paper were carried out using the full-wave domain decomposition finite element method (DD-FEM). This method is capable of quantifying truncation effects, the mutual coupling between the two array sections, and the far-field performance.